January-July private investment up 2.6% over 2011: ministry

Taipei, Aug. 15 (CNA) Private investment grew by 2.6 percent in the first seven months in 2012, compared with the same period of last year, the Ministry of Economics Affairs said Wednesday.

As of the end of July, the ministry had achieved 67.07 percent of its NT$1.1 trillion (US$36.64 billion) private investment target for this year, with the number of investment plans reaching 1,366, ministry officials said at a meeting to discuss how to attract and promote investment.

When broken down into private investment in different categories, the retail and wholesale industries accumulated total investment of NT$57 billion, representing 94 percent of its target for this year, while the metal and mechanical industries saw investment achieve 76 percent (NT$204.7 billion) of the target, said the ministry.

According to statistics collected by the ministry's Department of Investment Services as of the end of July, the number of Taiwanese businessmen that returned to invest in Taiwan reached 42 cases, with the total investment value reaching 69.2 percent of the target, or NT$34.6 billion.

In addition, foreign investment reached a 74.41 percent target value of US$7.44 billion, according to the department's data.

The major foreign investors in Taiwan were the United States, with US$1.86 billion, followed by Japan with US$906 million and Australia with US$442 million.

As for the top three industries in terms of foreign investment, the wholesale retail industry had the most investment at US$897 million and the biopharmaceutical industry had investment of US$794 million, while investment in other service industries reached US$787 million.

Ministry officials said there were still investment plans pending valued at over US$1 billion, and they expressed optimism that they could reach their investment target of US$10 billion this year.